Last Crossover Standing: We Take 7 New Models Off Road

Over the years we've seen family transportation undergo a series of metamorphoses. The station wagon of the 1970s gave way to the minivan in the '80s, which was succeeded by the SUV in the '90s. At each step along the way, buyers were itching to rebel against the status quo and drive a machine untainted by connotations of parental dorkiness. If you really want to understand why the Ford Explorer became the smash-hit family car of the 1990s, look to the fact that there were no Explorers in the 1970s. The Ford SUV let grunge-era drivers buy a vehicle that didn't trigger childhood memories of 500-mile drives to Aunt Mildred's house for her slide shows of the Twine Ball Museum.Now the SUV is itself the object of a generational backlash. And a lot of people who grew up in SUVs realize that they don't need low-range 4WD to get their kids to Dairy Queen, or a 10-mpg V8 to take the dogs to the park. Roughly a decade ago, three-row crossovers emerged, and the category has grown steadily since then.Three-row crossovers attempt to fuse minivan practicality with SUV bravado. The formula is fairly consistent: V6, AWD with no low range, unibody construction and a high seating position. While SUVs are typically built on truck frames, crossovers are nearly always based on cars. The rationale is simple: People almost never use SUVs off-road, so why carry around all that gas-guzzling truck hardware?And yet the implied justification for crossovers is that they deliver something that minivans can't: a capacity, however modest, for off-pavement adventure. To test these family drivers, we knew we had to include an off-road scenario that would bring the rugged-outdoorsman fantasy to life. Perhaps you never intend to drive a Kia Sorento up a five-story sand dune, but wouldn't you like to know that you could?Our seven vehicles represent both the latest and the proven players from the U.S., South Korea and Japan. We spent three days wringing them out at the test tra

Dodge Durango

Dodge Durango

Over the years we've seen family transportation undergo a series of metamorphoses. The station wagon of the 1970s gave way to the minivan in the '80s, which was succeeded by the SUV in the '90s. At each step along the way, buyers were itching to rebel against the status quo and drive a machine untainted by connotations of parental dorkiness. If you really want to understand why the Ford Explorer became the smash-hit family car of the 1990s, look to the fact that there were no Explorers in the 1970s. The Ford SUV let grunge-era drivers buy a vehicle that didn't trigger childhood memories of 500-mile drives to Aunt Mildred's house for her slide shows of the Twine Ball Museum.

Now the SUV is itself the object of a generational backlash. And a lot of people who grew up in SUVs realize that they don't need low-range 4WD to get their kids to Dairy Queen, or a 10-mpg V8 to take the dogs to the park. Roughly a decade ago, three-row crossovers emerged, and the category has grown steadily since then.

Three-row crossovers attempt to fuse minivan practicality with SUV bravado. The formula is fairly consistent: V6, AWD with no low range, unibody construction and a high seating position. While SUVs are typically built on truck frames, crossovers are nearly always based on cars. The rationale is simple: People almost never use SUVs off-road, so why carry around all that gas-guzzling truck hardware?

And yet the implied justification for crossovers is that they deliver something that minivans can't: a capacity, however modest, for off-pavement adventure. To test these family drivers, we knew we had to include an off-road scenario that would bring the rugged-outdoorsman fantasy to life. Perhaps you never intend to drive a Kia Sorento up a five-story sand dune, but wouldn't you like to know that you could?

Our seven vehicles represent both the latest and the proven players from the U.S., South Korea and Japan. We spent three days wringing them out at the test track, on the interstate and back roads, and, finally, at Silver Lake Sand Dunes. Towering over the shores of Lake Michigan, Silver Lake offers a 450-acre off-road playground where drivers can test their vehicles' abilities on an undulating sea of sand that sucks down off-roaders like few surfaces do. In fact, deep sand is exceedingly challenging because it offers such high traction, taxing the ability of all-wheel-drive systems to reliably distribute torque to all four wheels. But, of course, a tough test was exactly the point. Here are our impressions in ascending order of desirability.

Back in 2002, Honda introduced its new Pilot, with a 3.5-liter 240-hp V6. Nine years later, it has a 3.5-liter V6 that makes 250 hp. While power isn't necessarily the deciding factor when you're crossover shopping, the V6's modest output is representative of the Pilot's dated feel. The dashboard's center stack, for instance, appears to be inspired by an '80s boombox–the more buttons, slots and readouts, the better. (Do we really need a separate button to call up a DVD title?)

The Pilot's biggest problem, though, is its Billy Baldwin syndrome: It can't escape the shadow of its much more appealing sibling, the Odyssey. "There's no style or personality that sets this apart from the excellent Odyssey," wrote one tester. Functionally, the Pilot is an Odyssey with a better tow rating (4500 pounds versus 3500 pounds), worse gas mileage and a less versatile interior. The stubby shifter even pokes out of the dashboard, just like the Odyssey's–though in the Pilot, that shifter commands only five speeds. (The Odyssey is available with six.)

So the reason you'd buy a Pilot–other than for its image–is for its off-road ability. And the Pilot handled itself well out on the dunes, being one of the few vehicles that never got stuck. On the road, though, the Pilot's overwhelming vibe is indifference. The steering is numb, the ride is smooth, the V6 is quiet as long as you don't work it hard.

We like to think of Honda as the Japanese BMW–an engineering-driven company that knows how to infuse its products with a certain level of inspiration. But the Pilot needs a major dose of the pixie dust that used to enliven Honda's products. "This is the perfect focus-group car," read one logbook entry. "They checked all the boxes but forgot the most important one–fun."